He did a lot of Ersan things: drawing charges, missing shots from point-blank range, hustling on defense, getting blocked by Randy Foye, grabbing a lot of rebounds. If he shoots better, it’s a valuable performance, but he didn’t.

Middleton is a profession shot maker. Give him space and he’ll do his thing. He was busy on defense, too, making the right rotations and getting his long arms on a few balls. He gets bonus points for playing 44 minutes at high altitude and never showing signs of slowing down. Other than getting bowled over when he stepped in front of a fast-breaking Kenneth Faried, I don’t recall him getting shortchanged on any calls. Seems hard to take 21 shots without getting to the free throw line at least once.

Best player on the floor for either team, although Wilson Chandler finished in a strong way for Denver. After a season-long bout with yips and ball-stopping on offense, Sanders decisively took well-chosen shots, crashed the offensive glass and moved the ball when it wasn’t time to shoot. His touch inside was uncanny.

It didn’t happen in any appreciable way in this game, but if he maintains this knack for scoring, he’ll gain even more confidence to defend well at the other end. After two no-calls on first quarter misses, he did something unnoticeable to earn a technical foul, but regrouped (while staying out of foul trouble) to notch a career-high in points. He just needs to make his free throws.

Lots of hustle, didn’t make many mistakes, didn’t make enough shots. Guarding Ty Lawson is no small task and he did a reasonable job of it. He’s the only one of the Bucks starters who can routinely get to the free throw line. He looked a little winded in the second half.

Wolters got a lot of good looks near the rim and missed all of them, though one looked like a sure Anthony Randolph goaltend. Larry Sanders looks like a better player when Wolters is putting him in the right spots with passes. On defense, he contested jump shots well and got a piece of one Randy Foye’s.

The rare air of Denver probably isn’t the best spot to try to get back into optimal playing rhythm after a few games missed to injury. His low-post shots and putbacks weren’t falling and he took the most indecisive 18-footer you’ll ever see. He was a step slow rotating all game long, and his defensive miscues were ending in J.J. Hickson and Kenneth Faried dunks (see below).

He was on the court for a lot of the Bucks’ defensive implosions this game. In one condensed stretch he had: a bad pass, a forced post move miss, some sloppy help defense, and a dumb offensive foul that took a Knight layup off the board. On the other hand, he makes the Bucks a better rebounding team when he’s out there, he passes the ball to the right spot 9 times out of ten, and he creates AND makes free throws.

The Nuggets’ barrage of three-pointers began when he was in the game. He tried to drive between three Nuggets and turned the ball over. On the other end, he went under a screen and Foye hit a wide-open three. He left in the first half with a back issue and did not return.

He turned the ball over four times and only scoring five points. But the good news is that when he attacks the rim and doesn’t turn the ball over, he gets fouled. Almost always. He also hit a confident 18-footer in the final minutes when the game was close.

On the other end, he got lost on a couple of possessions per half, but he often forces opponents to move the ball away from his man. As soon as he stops falling for pump fakes — which he did plenty in this game — he’ll be a beast of a defender.

Five Things We Saw

Tabulating the numbers above, Knight, Ilyasova, and Wolters hit a combined 10-of-40 shots. To make matters worse, the trio of starters made just 1-of-15 shots inside of 6 feet. That’s soft finishing at its finest.

Wilson Chandler played phenomenally at the end. When the Bucks pulled within three points with 2:13 left, Chandler followed with three clutch baskets: two strong moves to the rim and one lucky bounce jump shot that hit the top of the glass before falling through.

John Henson didn’t have a good game and this is a reasonable one-play summary.

When the notion of tanking the 2013-14 season was first breached, this is what I had in mind: a well-contested, perfectly respectable loss. The Bucks played much better here than anything they threw up in late January.

Husband. Father. Blogger. Retired mathlete. I covered Larry Sanders' "Three Thumbs Up" game as credentialed media -- and failed to see well enough to witness the thumbing as it happened. On Twitter, I'm anaheimamigos.

5 Comments

A few of the bucks players have been wearing purple shoes the past few games. I think it is in honor of black history month. The NBA wore purple shoes on mlk Jr. day, so it seems some bucks players may just be continuing the tribute.

After a bad 3rd-quarter, it was fun to see the Bucks close the deficit to only 5 late in the game. Even though they weren’t playing great basketball, it seemed like they were really hustling on defense, and scrambling as best they could on offense.
With Larry, Khris, Giannis and Brandon out there much of the second half — along with John and Nate to a lesser extent — I feel like maybe I was watching the nucleus of a future team developing, and possibly a promising one. After that horrible sequence from Zaza noted above, he really hung in there, scrapped for some nice plays, and showed how a veteran presence can complement the young guys.
Like KL wrote, this is the kind of loss I can live with, at least to some degree, at least for now, especially with the focus on the young guys. It is hard having both of our point guards learning that role, but I wouldn’t make any rash trades to bring in another point.
I might be way off on this, and it might be wishful thinking, but I sense that maybe Khris is becoming a leader on this team: with hustle, intensity, calm, positivity, unselfishness, an improving all-around game, and that sweet outside shot. He got a foul guarding his man closely out near half-court early in the 4th-quarter, protested a little, then continued the tough defense when the Nuggets inbounded the ball. I wonder if that helped to motivate his teammates for their comeback.
I think KL, and the other Bucksketball guys, as well as other fans on this site, pick up some of the nuances in a game that I miss (being distractable and more of an impressionist), so I’m very interested to read about what others saw.
P.S. I really think Larry has the skills to be at least a solid offensive player, shooting face-up 15-footers and making short drives to the hoop using the glass. I wonder if he might be lifting his head up a bit on his free throws rather than keeping his eyes focused on the rim through the shot.

“When the notion of tanking the 2013-14 season was first breached, this is what I had in mind: a well-contested, perfectly respectable loss.”

My sentiments precisely. I want to see potential, which they haven’t shown much of for the better part of the season. A few new high profile players, an improved Sanders, and a growing Giannis is something we all want to see in 2014-15.